


Looking without Seeing

by pushingcrazies



Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Blindness, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-03-02
Updated: 2012-03-02
Packaged: 2017-10-31 23:50:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/349679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pushingcrazies/pseuds/pushingcrazies
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lestrade is going through a difficult transition period, and Sherlock (for once) is willing to help.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Looking without Seeing

"Is that you, Sherlock?” Lestrade whispered into the darkness.   Silly, pointless, as Sherlock had told him several times before, but he still couldn’t help it.  It was an instinct stronger than his rational mind to whisper when it was dark, even now that it was dark forever.  He also couldn’t help the way he sat forward, straining to see through the pitch black, even though he knew he wouldn’t be able to see anything.

“You’re getting better at distinguishing our footsteps,” came Sherlock’s voice.  “John has gone out for the evening.”

“Has he?  That’s good.”  No, it wasn’t good.  Before…this, John had been something of an unknown quantity, but a welcome ally against Sherlock’s madness.  Now, though, he was a lot easier for Lestrade to imagine his expressions and behaviours.  He was ordinary.  Predictable.  Sherlock, on the other hand, was impossible to anticipate without being able to see his facial expressions, which Lestrade was quickly finding out.  Consequently, he had become rather fonder of spending time with John instead of Sherlock, and preferred to have him around when he needed help with something.  “How much longer are you going to keep me hostage here?”

“Just until you’re more accustomed to your new…condition,” Sherlock replied.  The way he said it made Lestrade want to get off the bed, stumble in his general direction, and tear his bloody eyes out with his fingernails.  See how _he_ liked having this “new condition.”

“How am I supposed to become accustomed to it if I can barely leave the flat?” Lestrade demanded bitterly.

“You have given no indication you wish to leave.  You sit in here all day on your own, wallowing in your depression.”  His voice was cool, unruffled, and if Lestrade concentrated hard enough, he could imagine the look of passive disinterest that must be on his face right now.  He’d seen it enough times over the years to have it memorised.

“’M not depressed,” Lestrade muttered, settling back on the bed and looking away.  Not that it did any good; the view was the same no matter where he looked.  “’M learning braille.”

“Ah, of course.  How’s that working for you?”

The tinge of amusement was too much for Lestrade.  He chucked the book he was currently struggling through in what he hoped was the general direction of Sherlock’s head.  There was no mistaking when it thumped harmlessly on the ground.

There was a shuffle of fabric and Sherlock approached the bed.  “You are frustrated,” he said, any trace of amusement gone from his voice, “and you are taking it out on me because you think it’s all my fault.”

“It _is_ your fault,” Lestrade reminded him.  “And you know it, or else I wouldn’t be here right now.  You’d’ve given me up as useless and moved on to pestering Gregson or Dimmock instead of staying here and playing nursemaid.”  Because they both knew what this whole setup was: Sherlock was making up for putting Lestrade in a predicament that led his being permanently blinded.  And – heaven help them all – he actually felt guilty for it.

“You’re mostly right,” Sherlock said.  It was as close to a verbal apology as he would get.  “But I would never abandon you, even if you became totally useless.”

Lestrade’s head jerked slightly to one side, surprised by the near-compliment.  “Yeah…same back at you,” he mumbled.

There was a heavy silence, each man lost in his own private thoughts.  Sherlock was so quiet that Lestrade briefly wondered if he had somehow managed to leave the room without making a sound.  Before, it would have been possible, but nowadays Lestrade’s hearing seemed to pick up the slightest whisper of breath.  It had only taken a matter of hours after he woke up in the hospital for his other senses to start making up for his lack of sight.  His hearing became sharper, his fingers more sensitive.  Hell, even his sense of taste had become more acute.

The bed dipped as Sherlock lowered his body into a sitting position on the other side.  He probably did it gracefully, but when Lestrade tried to think what it must look like, his mind comes up blank.  Was he sitting with his back to Lestrade?  Was one leg tucked under him, his body twisted to face Lestrade?  Was he sitting cross-legged, his full attention on Lestrade?  He could not begin to guess.  “It feels like…” he hesitated, voice barely more than a whisper.  “It feels like the more I am learning the things I need to know now, the more I forget the things I used to know.”

There was a light touch on his knee, and Sherlock spoke in a voice almost as quiet as Lestrade’s.  His deep baritone is soothing, even more so than the comforting hand because touch was something he is not accustomed to experiencing when it came to Sherlock.  “How do you mean?”

“Like…” He gestured a bit.  “Like learning braille or memorising where all the furniture is.  Or how many steps from your room to the bathroom.  All that.  It’s pushing stuff like what your face looks like from my memory.  I can see you, I know what you look like, but the details are missing.”  He shook his head.  “I can’t even fucking remember what colour your eyes are.”

The hand on his knee withdrew and Sherlock said, “My eyes are green.”

Lestrade threw his head back, nearly braining himself on the wall, and covers his face with both hands because _damn it,_ leave it to Sherlock to completely miss the point.  There was a long pause in which Lestrade hoped Sherlock would give up on this whole comforting lark and leave, but he didn’t.  Stubborn arse, as always.  Instead, a cool hand clasped one of his and drew it away from his face.  He let it be tugged and positioned, and then he was touching something warm and a little rough.  A quick flick of his thumb told him it was Sherlock’s cheek.

“You can’t feel colours,” Sherlock said, and _I’ll be damned_ , he actually sounded embarrassed, “but maybe I can help you remember some of the details.”

Lestrade didn’t ask.  For once in his life he was bloody tired of asking, and if Sherlock was offering, then by God he was going to take everything he could.  He knelt up on the bed, inching closer to Sherlock until his knees were touching Sherlock’s leg.  He placed both hands on the face before him, savouring the warmth.  He wondered if Sherlock was blushing.

Sherlock may have claimed in the past that Lestrade was less than intelligent, but compared to Sherlock everyone was, so Lestrade didn’t really take it to heart.  What Lestrade _was_ , however, was methodical, even more so than most of his colleagues.  At a crime scene (when Sherlock wasn’t involved, anyway), he would sweep every inch of the surrounding area for potentially helpful clues.  Sometimes he wouldn’t know what to make of them, true, but he always spotted them before any of his teammates.

Lestrade started with his cheeks, marking the height and angle of his cheekbones.  From there, he followed the slightly gaunt dip down to his chin, inwards, and up to his lips.  Those he bypassed for the moment, skipping up to Sherlock’s nose.  Sherlock made a noise in the back of his throat that was either amusement or indignation, and Lestrade couldn’t bring himself to care.  He smirked, happy to have the upper hand for once, so to speak.  He licked his too-dry lips as his fingers quested upwards, tracing the shape of Sherlock’s nose, fingering the bridge, and spread outwards to feel his eyebrows.  One of them quirked up at his touch, making him grin.  His fingers stretched across the forehead, noting the distance between brow and hairline.  The skin here was slightly damp; was it warm in Sherlock’s bedroom?  Lestrade didn’t think so, but then again, he wasn’t the one who had someone’s hands all over him, even if it was for pity’s sake.

Lestrade’s hands cupped the outer reaches of Sherlock face, dragging down towards the chin once more.  Stubble along the jawline; it was either later than Lestrade had imagined or else Sherlock had got caught up in an experiment again.  This time, he allowed himself to briefly press against those soft, dry lips, which were slightly parted.  He resisted the urge to linger, and instead moved up and out to rub Sherlock’s ears a bit.  There was  a small dent in the lobe of the left one, not the sort of mark made by a healed piercing, but just one of those little idiosyncrasies the body naturally produces.  He carefully marked the grooves and curves of the ears, how they differed, how they were the same, then carded his hands through Sherlock’s hair.  It was softer than he had ever imagined, and completely unruly.  He straightened out the curls, like a barber measuring the hair before trimming it.  He noted the length and coarseness before moving on to the scalp itself.  There were even more interesting grooves to be found here, and Lestrade noted each one before moving on.  He reached the base of Sherlock’s neck and gave it a light scratch, which caused Sherlock to take a shuddering breath.  Lestrade smirked.

From there, he moved back around to the front of Sherlock’s neck, pausing on a small mole on one side.  One thumb traced over the Adam’s apple, while the other hand occupied itself with measuring the feel of his shirt.

“It’s the purple one,” Sherlock whispered, breaking the spell of the silence.  His breath ghosted softly across Lestrade’s face, reminding him how close they were.

Lestrade ran both hands down Sherlock’s lean and surprisingly hard chest.  People always thought Sherlock was skinny, but the truth was he had a well-muscled torso.  He was fairly broad in the shoulders, too, which Lestrade was now carefully noting.  He gave the muscles there a firm massage, measuring the tenseness and strength therein.  He smoothed his hands down Sherlock’s arms.  Long sleeved shirt, of course.  Always long sleeved.  One hand grasped Sherlock’s forearm, where he knew the track marks were hidden.  They were faded by now, but they were still there.

Suddenly Sherlock’s hands stilled his and gently removed them from his body.  Lestrade wondered if he had crossed a line, but then he heard the rustle of fabric and a shifting of weight in front of him.  Now he was still kneeling, but Sherlock, it seemed, was mirroring his position.  More rustling and what sounded like a shirt being untucked from trousers.  Lestrade sucked in a breath, wondering if he was hallucinating.  He could almost _hear_ the smirk on Sherlock’s face when he said, “If we’re going to do this, we might as well do it properly.”  He picked up Lestrade’s hand and placed it smack-dab in the centre of his chest.

Lestrade bit his lip, concentrating on the play of muscles.  One pectoral jumped as he brushed his hand sideways, accidentally grazing a nipple.  He swept back upwards and added his second hand, cataloguing collarbones, sternum, and ribs.  There were little variations every once in a while, where Sherlock had been scarred by some little incident or another.  Some of them Lestrade had been present for, like the long scar just below his ribs, where a would-be assassin had gotten lucky with a knife.  The wound hadn’t been very deep at all, but Lestrade could still remember the feel of blood running over his hands as he applied pressure while Sally called for an ambulance.

There was no hair on his chest, which Lestrade found immensely amusing, but there was some soft, curly fuzz just below Sherlock’s navel.  Lestrade noted it and moved on, ignoring the warm feeling spreading through his lower body at the thought of where that hair led.  Thinking those sorts of thoughts right now would only lead to more trouble than either of them were capable of dealing with at the moment.  Instead, Lestrade brushed his fingertips back up Sherlock’s chest with the lightest of touches.  Sherlock shivered, muscles jumping involuntarily.  Lestrade ran his hands firmly down Sherlock’s arms again, this time feeling the difference in texture between the unmarked upper arms and the needle-riddled forearms.  He picked up first one hand, then the other, holding each one between the both of his own, mapping the wrinkles, veins, and ridges.  He measured the length of each finger, then pressed both of Sherlock’s hands together, palms facing each other, and felt for any variations.  He was amused to note that Sherlock’s right ring finger was longer than the left one, but the left thumb was longer than the right.  He circled his fingers around Sherlock’s wrists, noting how thin they were.

“Turn around,” Lestrade whispered, releasing his hands.  Sherlock did as he was instructed, turning his back towards Lestrade, though still kneeling.  Lestrade opened his knees to accommodate Sherlock’s body while getting closer, though not too close.  This whole situation was taking an unexpected effect on Lestrade, who was desperate not to let Sherlock know (though, of course he did).  Lestrade ran his hands down Sherlock’s back, feeling more scars and more moles as he did.  He traced the shoulder blades, then dug his hands into the muscles, massaging away any last remnants of tenseness.  Sherlock moaned, an ungodly sound, and melted into Lestrade’s hands.

The room now felt stiflingly hot, and both men were breathing hard.  Sherlock’s back was peppered with sweat, and Lestrade could feel matching perspiration on his own brow.  Before his rational mind could catch up with his actions, he leaned forward and licked a quick stripe across Sherlock’s left shoulder, tasting, testing, savouring.  Sherlock’s breath hitched.

“Perhaps we should not…” his voice trailed away.

Lestrade was at the other end of the bed as quickly as he could scramble away.  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean –“

“No,” Sherlock interrupted sharply.  Then, softer, “No.  I just do not want you getting the wrong impression.”

“Sherlock,” Lestrade warned.  “Now is not the time to be all mysterious and, well, _you._   Just tell me what you’re thinking.”

There were the sounds of fidgeting as Sherlock struggled with his hatred of expressing real emotions.  “I do not want…you to think this is…some sort of pity fuck.”  The word sounded so foreign and wrong on his lips, and it turned Lestrade on even more.  “I don’t want you thinking I am only doing this out of guilt.”

Lestrade knew he was right, damn him.  Why did he have to be so bloody smart all the time?  “But you do want…?”

“Yes.”  It was said so quietly even Lestrade almost didn’t catch it.  “Yes, I want.”  A pause, then decisively, “We should go somewhere tomorrow.”

“Where?” Lestrade asked, mystified by the abrupt change of topic.

“Anywhere you like.  Perhaps down to the pub for a pint.”

“You hate the pub.”

Sherlock shrugged; Lestrade could practically feel it.  “If we’re going to get you out of here more often, we may as well start with places you’re comfortable with.”

“Okay.”

“It’s getting late; you should try to sleep.”  He didn’t mention the nightmares they all knew Lestrade had been having ever since he’d been released from the hospital.

“Okay.”

A pair of hot, dry lips pressed against his, startling Lestrade for a moment before he relaxed into the kiss.  It didn’t last long, but Lestrade could feel his lips tingling long after Sherlock slipped out of the room.


End file.
